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An Ever-Fixed Mark
A star trail in the Gorges de la Loire nature reserve, France.
A star trail in the Gorges de la Loire Nature Reserve, near Saint-Étienne a few miles southwest of Lyon in France; the lights below are of Saint-Just-Saint-Rambert. The North Star (Polaris) is the ‘ever-fixèd mark’ that lies at the centre of the trail. Shakespeare likened love to the North Star, used by mariners as a way to calculate latitude and thus steer their ships (barks) through perilous seas.
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A star trail in the Gorges de la Loire Nature Reserve, near Saint-Étienne a few miles southwest of Lyon in France; the lights below are of Saint-Just-Saint-Rambert. The North Star (Polaris) is the ‘ever-fixèd mark’ that lies at the centre of the trail. Shakespeare likened love to the North Star, used by mariners as a way to calculate latitude and thus steer their ships (barks) through perilous seas.
Introduction
Sonnet 116 was published in 1609, when William Shakespeare was forty-five and still working as an actor in London. The capital was ravaged that year by particularly relentless outbreaks of plague, which perhaps helps to explain the sombre tone of his poem about love, the one constant in a world of sickness, age and death.
LET me not to the marriage of true* minds
Admit impediments; love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.*
O no, it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth’s unknown, although his height be taken.*
Love’s not Time’s fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle’s compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.*
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.
‘True’ means not only ‘genuine’ but also ‘faithful, loyal’.
That is, when someone tries to take love away, love does not obey.
That is, love can act as a guide even if we do not know exactly what it is, just as a star could be used by medieval mariners to chart the path of a ship (bark or barque) through the seas even though at that time no one knew what stars were.
‘Doom’ is judgement, and hence, the Day of Judgment.
1. What is the author aiming to achieve in writing this?
2. Note any words, devices or turns of phrase that strike you. How do they help the author communicate his ideas more effectively?
3. What impression does this passage make on you? How might you put that impression into words?
Based on The English Critic (1939) by NL Clay, drawing on The New Criticism: A Lecture Delivered at Columbia University, March 9, 1910, by J. E. Spingarn, Professor of Comparative Literature in Columbia University, USA.
Spinners Find in Think and Speak
For each group of words, compose a sentence that uses all three. You can use any form of the word: for example, cat → cats, go → went, or quick → quickly, though neigh → neighbour is stretching it a bit.
This exercise uses words found in the accompanying passage.
1 I. Edge. Never.
2 Bark. Bend. Worth.
3 Find. Look. Man.
Variations: 1. include direct and indirect speech 2. include one or more of these words: although, because, despite, either/or, if, unless, until, when, whether, which, who 3. use negatives (not, isn’t, neither/nor, never, nobody etc.)
Statements, Questions and Commands Find in Think and Speak
Use each word below in a sentence. Try to include at least one statement, one question and one command among your sentences. Note that some verbs make awkward or meaningless words of command, e.g. need, happen.
This exercise uses words found in the accompanying passage.
1 Love. 2 Time. 3 Mind. 4 Mark. 5 Star. 6 Let. 7 Edge. 8 Bear. 9 Shake.
Variations: 1. use a minimum of seven words for each sentence 2. include negatives, e.g. isn’t, don’t, never 3. use the words ‘must’ to make commands 4. compose a short dialogue containing all three kinds of sentence: one statement, one question and one command
Homonyms Find in Think and Speak
Each of the words below has more than one possible meaning. Compose your own sentences to show what those different meanings are.
This exercise uses words found in the accompanying passage.
1. Brief. 2. Man. 3. Let. 4. Bark. 5. Bore. 6. Even. 7. Bear. 8. Found.
Add Vowels Find in Think and Speak
Make words by adding vowels to each group of consonants below. You may add as many vowels as you like before, between or after the consonants, but you may not add any consonants or change the order of those you have been given. See if you can beat our target of common words.
rps (7+1)
rapes. raps. reaps. repose. rips. ropes. rupees.
reps.
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